The present invention relates to tone generation apparatus to which a plug-in board is removably attachable and tone generation methods for use with the tone generation apparatus.
Hitherto, it has been known to attach, to a tone generator apparatus or electronic musical instrument, a tone-generating plug-in board (hereinafter also referred to as a tone generator plug-in board) for extending the tone generating functions or an effect imparting plug-in board (hereinafter also referred to as an effect plug-in board) for extending the effect functions. For example, by inserting or attaching such a tone generator plug-in board to a slot of an electronic musical instrument, tones different in type from those generatable by the electronic musical instrument alone can be generated depending on a particular nature of a tone generation scheme employed in the tone generator plug-in board, and also the number of simultaneously-generatable tones can be increased effectively. Examples of the tone generator mountable on the tone generator plug-in board include an analog modeling tone generator of an analog synthesizer based on a combination of “VCO+VCF+VCA”, FM tone generator, waveform memory tone generator, and a physical model tone generator simulating the tone generating principles of an acoustic musical instrument. Further, by attaching an effect plug-in board to a slot of an electronic musical instrument, it is possible to impart a variety of effects such as a harmony effect.
One example of the tone generator apparatus where such a plug-in board can be used is disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-open Publication No. HEI-10-319952 corresponding to U.S. Pat. No. 6,069,311. The disclosed tone generator apparatus is arranged to load, into the main body of the apparatus, names of tone colors selectively available from the plug-in board and names of parameters editable via the plug-in board and visually display the loaded tone color names and parameter names on a display of the main body of the apparatus. This tone generator apparatus, however, has the problem that each time a tone color is to be selected, there arises a need to transfer the tone color name, corresponding to a designated tone color number, from the plug-in board to the main body of the apparatus so as to display the tone color name, and thus the tone-color selection operation would take a relatively long time due to inquiries made to the plug-in board about the tone color selection. Also, each time a tone color parameter is to be edited, the disclosed tone generator apparatus operates to transfer the parameter name, corresponding to a designated parameter number, from the plug-in board to the main body of the apparatus so as to display the parameter name, and thus the parameter editing operation would take a relatively long time due to inquiries made to the plug-in board about the editing.
Further, although the main body of the apparatus sometimes requires editing of a custom voice possessed by (i.e., available from) the plug-in board, the custom voice is, in practice, edited outside the tone generator apparatus and then transferred to the plug-in board. Therefore, in the event that the main body of the apparatus edits the custom voice, the editing by the main body of the apparatus would conflict with the editing performed outside; for this reason, the editing by the main body of the apparatus is inhibited (or nor permitted) in the disclosed tone generator apparatus. Namely, there arises the problem that the main body of the apparatus can not edit a custom voice possessed by the plug-in board.
Further, examples of plug-in boards prepared for the conventional tone generator apparatus may include one which is equipped with a sequenced voice. The “sequenced voice” is such a voice whose tone color data include, in addition to ordinary data (such as those indicative of a waveform shape, pitch variations and tone volume envelope variations) pattern data, such as arpeggio pattern data, that indicate respective relative tone pitches, tone generation timing and duration of a plurality of notes. If such a sequenced voice is selected, a plurality of note-on/note-off events corresponding to the pattern data would be generated in response to a tone generation (note-on) instruction. However, because MIDI signals, which is performance information, are supplied directly to the plug-in board in the conventional tone generator apparatus, the supplied MIDI signals would not appropriately synchronize with a performance on the tone generator apparatus although they synchronize with externally supplied clock signals (i.e., MIDI tempo clock pulses).
Furthermore, with the plug-in board provided for the above-discussed conventional tone generator apparatus, custom voice data, obtained by editing preset voice data of the board, are stored in a volatile memory on the board. In this case, however, there would arise the problem that the custom voice stored in the volatile memory can not be used unless the custom voice data originally stored in an external device, such as a personal computer or sequencer, connected to the tone generator apparatus are transferred (bulk-transferred) to the volatile memory after turning on the power to (i.e., powering-up of) the tone generator apparatus.
Furthermore, in the conventional tone generator apparatus, each performance part using the tone generator of the plug-in board is selected in advance, and examples of the plug-in board include one designed as a mono-part tone generator which can be allocated or set to only one performance part and one designed as a multi-part tone generator which can be set to a plurality of performance parts. However, because the mono-part tone generator can be set to only one performance part, any other performance part can not use the tone generator of that plug-in board unless the settings of the parts using the plug-in board are changed. In this case, arrangements may be made for allowing any performance part to make use of the tone generator of the plug-in board in response to a tone color designating instruction (combination of bank select and program change), which would, however, lead to likelihood of the tone color of the mono-part tone generator being designated in a plurality of performance parts.